Ram

Osho, “Why keep saying ‘Ram Ram’? You don’t find Ram that way. You say ‘Ram’ and Ram is gone; Ram is ever flowing on. By saying you cannot grasp Ram; by moving you cannot grasp Ram. Ram forever abides within; in all directions only Ram is.”

Beautiful words. But why make them into a question? They already contain the answer. They are direct and simple; they don’t even need commentary. What could be simpler than this? “Ram Ram karat kahi?” Why do you keep saying “Ram Ram”? Ram is not something to be said; Ram is to be cherished in the heart. Whom are you saying it to? Whom are you calling? Whom are you shouting at? Ram is not far away! Kabir says: Has God gone deaf? Has your God become so deaf that you have to climb a high minaret and shout? What need is there to keep repeating the word “Ram”? Grasp the feeling. Hold the feeling in your heart—like a pregnant woman holds her child in her womb, so cradle the feeling of Ram within. “Ram Ram karat kahi, Ram aise milat nahin.” If merely speaking, repeating “Ram Ram,” or wrapping yourself…

Ram is one of the names of god. In india we have one thousand names for god. The basic idea is that all names are of god -- obviously, because there is nobody else other than god so all names are his, all forms are his. It is god manifest in everything. Ram is one of the names of god, and the indian term ram, if read backwards, becomes 'mara'; that means death. So life and death are not two separate things. If you read this one way it is life, god himself, if you read the other way it is death itself... so life and death are two aspects of the same coin. There is a story about valmiki; he was an uneducated man, very rough. He was a robber and a murderer, and he was going to rob a saint.

Many friends have asked: Osho, is there no place at all for japa? We chant Om, the Gayatri; some chant Ram-Ram, some the Namokar—this or that. Is there no use in these? You never speak in favor of chanting!

Even human names are fictitious. You were born, and then a name was given to you. You came without a name—nameless. For convenience, parents stick on a label: this one is Ram, this one Vishnu, this one Krishna. These names are makeshift, false, pasted on from outside. No person truly has a name. That tree standing there—does it have a name? A tree has no name. All names are human givings. If humans were to vanish from the earth, would anything have a name? Nothing would. The trees would still be there, the mango would still be there; the moon and stars would still be there—but there would be no names. Even now, they have no names of their own. Names do not exist in existence; they are a human invention. And we are so clever we have not only named things—we have named God as well. Names are a…

Osho, “Ramnam janyo nahin, bhai puja mein hani; kahi Rahim kyon manihain, Jam ke kinkar kani.” You have named the discourse series beginning today after the great poet Rahim’s couplet: Ramnam janyo nahin. Osho, is death truly only for those who do not know Ram? How is this Ram known? And, Osho, what is worship?

The biggest liars in this world are those believers who, without search, without inquiry, without any exploration, have accepted God. What impotence is this? The shadow of this impotence covers the whole earth. These grand churches and towering temples and minarets reaching the sky—these only hide your impotence, nothing else. Those temple bells, these calls to prayer from mosques, these church prayers, these lights and incense in the Shiva shrines—all this is pomp, deception, dishonesty. It keeps you complacent that believing is enough, knowing is unnecessary. Go to church on Sunday—enough. Get the Satyanarayana story recited once in a while—on loan from a two-bit priest. Or distribute sweets at a temple, or fast and abstain—job done. Whom are you fooling? I look into your eyes and see you are not fooling anyone but yourself. And the greatest deceit in this world is to deceive oneself. If you want to know—do…